The Phantom Prince
by IllusoryMisconceptions
Summary: "If I asked, would you tell me?" There was a pause. "It depends, Danny." His mother's voice sounded calm enough, but her shoulders had tensed some. He sighed, ready for the plunge. "What am I?" The plate she had held clattered to the floor.
1. Prologue: The Phantom Prince

First fic, be nice. I'll probably have chapter one (and a better summary) up in a few days, hopefully.

**Disclaimer**: I don't own DP, otherwise it would have never been cancelled.

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><p><strong>The Phantom Prince<strong>: Prologue

His world was a blur of sights and sensations, where up could have been down and the cool chest he was pressed to—covered in a thick, ebony pelt that looked almost green in the right light—could have easily been a figment of his fevered mind. He was ill, and gravely so if his raised temperature was any indication.

The cool night did little to soothe his fever, and the gentle rocking he received as the beast cradling him ran from some unseen pursuer only made him uncomfortable and dizzy. When he tried to voice his distress, the creature squeezed him lightly, murmuring soothing words that he couldn't understand but took comfort in anyway.

He was then surprised that it didn't strike him as odd that the wolf-like—possibly, but that was all he could tell by the dim light of the moon—being was _speaking_.

Then again, that didn't really matter.

What mattered, his muddled mind tried to remind him, was the fact that it was taking him far away from something _else_ as fast as its legs could carry the both of them; as for what that something could be, and why it frightened his monstrous protector, he wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Not that he would; he could hardly remember where he was or why his little fingers were busily seeking reassurance in dark fur. Even his own name seemed foreign to him in this fever-dream.

But just as he thought this, his world again shifted.

He felt himself abruptly stop, and be lowered to the ground only seconds before the uproar. He squeezed his eyes tightly as angry screams, explosive blasts and horrible snarls that he hoped to never hear again seemed to swell from nothing.

More cries and muted growls arose from the confusion of battle, and by the time he heard the slick sound of tearing flesh and the drip, drip, drip of something he'd rather not think about, it was all he could do to contain his own cries.

_I'm next_, he thought to himself, and so he chanced one last look at his would-be attacker, only to gape in horror at the sight that greeted him.

The faces of his parents, twisted with rage and something like curiosity, stared back.


	2. It Began with a Plan

A/N:I know I said I was going to change the summary, but quite a few people suggested that I leave it, so it's gonna stay. Instead, I'll put a few details about the story here, for anyone who wants to read them.

The Phantom Prince is an AU fic, rated T for safety and possibly darker themes and character death to come. It's centered around the idea of a key thing being different about DP- something I'm sure many of you have guessed already- and will definitely deviate from the original DP storyline.

Thanks for reading and all of the love you've given my story so far! Enjoy :) ~IM

**Disclaimer: **Nope, still don't own it, just the plot

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><p><strong>Chapter One:<strong> It Began with a Plan

The girl sighed as she drifted out of the classroom, her companion not too far behind her. It was shaping up to be another horribly long school day, and the droning voice of Mr. Scales wasn't exactly helping the fact that she knew that the weekend was still a day and a half away; Math might've been one of her favorite subjects, but she still hated the hour-and-a-half of lecture and English before that had been a _pain. _At least they were already halfway done with Thursday, now, and Tucker_ had_ said something earlier about planning a 'weekend o' fun' for the three of them.

Whoop-de-freakin' doo.

Who knew high school could be so _dreary_. Wasn't it supposed to be the peak of your life, or something? Two weeks and she was already sick of it—and this coming from a girl who wore black every day. The only highlight of it all was that her two best friends in the whole world were with her in this prison of a school….

Well, on the bright—I mean, dark—side, they'd been let out early by their teacher; that left plenty of time before lunch for something that had been nagging her since about 8 AM that morning, when a certain dark-haired boy had rushed in—five minutes late—to Mr. Lancer's class looking flustered, out of breath, and a little bit like he'd slept in his jeans and favorite white t-shirt the night before.

"Danny, are you okay?"

At the half-hearted glare she received, Samantha Manson—self-proclaimed goth geek, recyclo-vegetarian and also, most importantly, Daniel Fenton's _best friend_—couldn't help the sheepish grin that formed in reply. Sometimes her fellow teen could be a little touchy about that particular sentiment. "Sorry, you know me—."

"Yeah, standard question." Her friend finished, looking a little sheepish himself, though she caught the exasperation in his tone. "I'm fine, though. I didn't sleep well is all…." He rubbed the back of his neck, then, turning his head away as if to look down the hall for the missing member of their trio.

Sam didn't bother mentioning that it was still a good five minutes until pass, and that Tucker Foley's honors class wasn't one to let out before the allotted time was up. She didn't bother, because she saw right through his little ruse. Danny probably hadn't wanted her to worry, and now he was averting his gaze, trying to escape the piercing, violet eyes that knew him too well.

It really didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out when he was hiding something.

But it was hard not to worry, especially when she'd noticed the too-pale flesh of her childhood friend this morning; now that she could see him up close, the sickly tone of his skin made the dark circles under his clear, stunningly blue eyes stand out in sharp contrast. While Danny had said he hadn't slept well, his eyes said he hadn't slept at all.

Plus he'd been so weirdly jumpy this morning; he'd actually flinched when Lancer had yelled about being late, which caused Dash—local jerk and "king" of the freshman class—to mock him throughout the rest of the class period. Of course, that little incident could've been related to the Saturday detention he'd be serving for his third tardy in a row.

Still, any way you read it, the signs were clear—something was wrong with the fourteen-year old boy. He definitely wasn't feeling very well, either, if his worn expression was any indication. He really should've stayed home, today.

She scoffed at that. _Yeah, no kidding. Understatement of the _century. He looked like he was about to fall over any second, and Sam was trying—though not as hard as she could have—to cover up the fact that she was constantly watching him in case he did.

It was painfullyobvious, really, how sick Danny looked; even someone as regularly disappointed by the adult population as Samantha—who preferred _Sam_, thank-you-very-much—was surprised that no one, not even Danny's _parents_ had done anything about it. She expected that from most of the students at Casper High, but come _on_, people open your _eyes_! Some days she felt like she was the only one looking out for the guy, Danny himself included.

She frowned. That wasn't right; whenever Danny relapsed into…whatever he had, his parents were always the first ones at his side. She couldn't count on her hand the number of times they had allowed him to go to school after he'd had one of his "episodes" during the night—because that number would be zero—and no one was more protective of the boy than Maddie, his mother. She could still remember clearly what had happened back in preschool, when the woman found out that Dash and a few other kids were teasing Danny about his medical condition; from that time on, the football star had hated the youngest Fenton and held a deep-rooted fear of all things green and foamy.

No, Mr. and Mrs. Fenton definitely cared about their son as much as—but certainly not more than—herself.

Then there was Jazz, Danny's brilliant, and a little overbearing, older sister. Sam knew better than anyone the lengths that Jazz would go to for her little brother—she still had a scar from the time the girl had pushed her down for bullying him in first grade. Sam was ashamed to admit it, but little her had been a bit of a follower at the time; hence her hate of all things popular, now. She'd cried, sure, and then a certain blue-eyed wonder had come to her aid; telling his sister off for "picking on kids that are little-er than you are."

Sam and Danny had been inseparable ever since.

But she had to admit, unless Danny was outright _avoiding_ his family…. But Sam broke from her thoughts then, looking up sharply at the sound of her name.

"Hellooo, earth to Saaam? Space cadet, much? And I thought I was the one who wanted to be an astronaut." He paused, waiting for a laugh or a sarcastic remark that didn't come.

Instead, he fidgeted awkwardly under her scrutinizing gaze, and quickly turned back towards the hall. People were starting to leave their classrooms, now, and Danny had to talk a little above the noise to be heard. "Well, it's almost lunchtime…where could Tucker be…? Probably asking out all the girls in his class, ha, if he hasn't already."

He was grinning—weakly trying to look more like himself, really—but even though his eyes were more tired than amused, Sam couldn't help the frown that grew with her latest leap in logic.

"It happened again, didn't it?" There was silence. They both knew it wasn't a question. "Last night. You had a fit and you didn't tell your—."

"Sam, like I told you, I just—." He interrupted her, immediately detecting the hurt in her voice and trying to defuse the situation before it escalated. Obviously, Sam was upset, and an upset Sam—especially one that was angry with _him_—wasn't a good thing.

"—didn't get enough sleep? Yeah, like I really buy that." She glared at him, face impassive. She wouldn't let it go, not now that she thought she had it all figured out; she would never let it go, and they both knew it.

"_Sam_." He frowned. This could get out of hand if he didn't keep his cool; and he was pretty irritable from lack of sleep already. He took a deep, calming breath. "Like I said before, I'm fine, and perfectly capable of taking care of myse—." He cut himself off at the suddenly dark look that crossed her face.

So much for that idea.

"Danny." This was dangerous territory. Alarms were blaring in his brain. Maybe he should just admit she was right, apologize and save himself the trouble.

Of course, Danny could be just as stubborn as she, when he wanted to be.

"I told you, I'm _fine_." He snapped, and suddenly both of them were whispering furiously, fighting to be heard over the other while still keeping the topic of their conversation away from prying ears.

"Don't give me that, you _know—_."

"—know _what_—."

"—that you're _supposed_ to tell your parents every time it happens! Do you think it's _normal_ for people to just seizure in the middle of the night—."

"—you don't even know if I did! And, honestly, I think you're overreacting—."

"—overreacting_? Overreacting?_ You're the one who—." Her voice rose a pitch in indignation, and several heads turned in the small crowd shuffling towards the cafeteria.

"—_Sam_!" Danny hissed, suddenly very conscious of the curious eyes that their little whisper match was starting to draw. "Please, just trust me." At her continuing glare, he sighed. He'd lost, but at least she was listening. "I'll tell you and Tucker at lunch, okay?"

Appeased, Sam dutifully shut her mouth—hardly containing the smug smile that was forming where a frustrated scowl had been seconds before. Neither of them seemed to notice an amused techno-geek—sporting a poorly hidden grin—waltz up in true, Foley fashion.

"Dude, the more I see you two lovebirds together, the more I think that you fight like an old married couple."

Several undignified sounds tumbled into the air before the unified response followed suit. "We are NOT lovebirds!"

"Alright, alright." Tucker held his hands up in a placating gesture, grin still firmly in place. Danny frowned at the slight twinkle in his eye but was glad his friend was finally out of class all the same. Though he'd lost his appetite sometime after Sam had figured him out, he still wanted to get out of the hallway and over to the "privacy" of their cafeteria table.

They walked through the double doors, settling into the long line that had formed already, and Sam and Tucker's idle chatter let Danny think a moment on how he was going to explain everything to his companions.

He hadn't intended to tell his two best friends about his dream just yet, or ever, but if Sam wanted the truth, he couldn't deny her. She and Tuck had been such good friends to him over the years, sticking by him when few others would; it was the least he could do to tell them—at least they'd know how much he trusted them.

He hadn't even told his parents. Not because he was afraid, he just couldn't face them, not after seeing the hate and fury that twisted their expressions in his dreams, and knowing that those images of his mother and father would be all he could see for at least the rest of the day if not his life.

It wasn't as though that particular dream was new; no, he'd had it loads of times, especially whenever he was sick. He just hadn't ever seen his pursuers before, and, while it didn't really scare him now so much as make him wonder what that dream could mean, he'd been a complete mess before coming to school.

When he woke up…he couldn't explain it. It was like something deep inside of him had been triggered in a primal reaction to his foggy dream-terrors. It wasn't really that he was _afraid_ of anything in particular, not even his parents, it was just… he shuddered at the memory of the feeling. That feeling of sudden _wrongness_ that made him want to jump out of his skin and away from everything he'd ever known.

Like an animal, he'd cowered in his room until the consuming, visceral _fear_ gripping him became too much, causing him to run out the door—with no regards as to how deranged he must've looked—bolting from bed to school without explanation or stopping to check his appearance.

He vaguely remembered his mother calling to him, telling him that he didn't have to go to school if he didn't want to—she worried, but she trusted Danny to make smart decisions about his own health, too, which is probably why she let him go at all. He was glad for that; he didn't know what he'd do if she'd seen the wild, frayed look in his eyes before he'd managed to calm himself back down.

He sighed. All of these things weighed a bit heavily on his mind, but he had to try to push that away for now, at least so he could satisfy a certain goth girl. But though he was certainly going to tell Sam and Tucker about his dream and the fact that it was a recurring one—he'd promised, after all—that didn't mean he had to tell them what happened when he woke up.

And so he sat down at his usual seat with his usual friends, resolute on the fact that he would not, could not tell these two people he trusted more than anyone else exactly_ what _he had felt this morning. Partly because he was truly afraid of what they might think of him if he did, and mostly because he feared the implications of what he'd felt if he admitted it aloud.

For when Danny had awoken that morning, clutching at his chest in horror, he had felt nothing thrumming beneath his icy fingers.

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><p>It was a beautiful day outside; the sun was shining, the birds were chirping, and all of Casper High could hardly wait to claim the picnic tables and soak in the warm autumn rays.<p>

All except for a certain, close-knit trio of students-who believed their conversation more safely held indoors-that is.

One of the two boys of the group, busily eating away at his greasy, overflowing sloppy joe, was only half-listening to the serious conversation held by his two best friends growing up.

Not only was he hungry—and a man as strong and fine as Tucker Foley needed his food—but they were busy whispering about something that didn't really concern him. Something about Danny having a recurring nightmare, it felt so real, his parents were there, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Now don't get him wrong; sure, he cared about his best friend-since-he-was-born's troubles, but he just couldn't see what was so troubling about them. Wasn't this, like, normal, or something?

Danny was a messed up kid, he and Sam both knew that; heck, they'd always known that, and Tucker thought it was a testament to their character that they were still valiantly loyal to their friend despite all the flack he received for his strange 'episodes,' as their counselor had called them, and even _stranger_ family.

Rumors were constantly circulating around the retired ghost-hunters; people were cruel, after all, and oftentimes sneered that Danny had been some kind of experiment of his parents, and that all of his physical and mental maladies—like paranoia, obviously…who dreams that their own parents are trying to kill them, really—were some weird by-product of that.

Though Tucker would never peg the Fenton family as the "mad scientist" types, and certainly didn't believe the lies that he often heard in his honors classes—where Danny and Sam weren't around to take offense, and he was too afraid to speak up—he had to admit, there was some stock to them.

After all, the Fenton family had been famous—Amity Park's well renowned ghost experts and hunters-for-hire—and especially so during the First Ghost War, before Jazz or Danny or any of them were around. Then, almost immediately after Danny was born, they'd retired. They claimed that they simply wanted to return to researching and developing a peaceful way to deal with the ghost threat, that they'd had enough of fighting, were through with the Guys in White—a mysterious, government-funded organization known for its strict, no-tolerance policy regarding ghostly entities—and that was it. They walked out, and never hunted ghosts again.

But even Tucker knew that their sudden change of heart was strange.

According to his dad, the Fenton's had always expressed a deep hatred of ghosts—to the point of making other people in the room uncomfortable—and that wasn't something that just disappeared over night. Most people hated ghosts, due to the war, and the vast majority didn't even see them as anything more than a menace that needed to be destroyed; but the Fenton's had hated them the most.

And they had no qualms about helping the GiW rip every putrid piece of ectoplasm apart, molecule by molecule, for at least ten _years_.

Until Danny was born, that is. But why Danny's birth could've spurred such a change in his parents, Tucker would never know. But he could certainly guess.

He suppressed a shudder at a sudden memory of Danny, seizing in the middle of his eighth birthday party, mouth flecked with oddly green-tinged foam as his eyes rolled up into the back of his head. He'd been unable to look away, but horrified all the same; who wouldn't be, seeing for the first time the odd convulsions and silent screams of someone trapped within their own body?

One moment, they were all singing happy birthday, and Danny was told to make a wish; next thing he knew, an odd, genie-like ghost appeared out of nowhere. Tucker didn't see the ghost though, or the fight Danny's father and sister went through trying to trap it or chase it away.

All he saw was Danny, and his mother—sobbing, clutching and rocking her baby as he shook and twitched uncontrollably—and he had to stop eating for a moment to let his stomach settle at the thought of Jack Fenton suddenly bounding over, syringe in hand, and jamming a couple of milliliters worth of glowing ectoplasm into his son's jerking chest like a freaking EpiPen.

Tucker shook his head. No way could he eat after remembering _that_. If exposure to ghosts for some odd ten years or so could do that to your future kids, well, he respected their decision to leave the profession.

But it was strange…. He supposed he must have been the only one to see the little Fenton family drama-no one had ever brought it up before-and he hadn't thought anything of it at the time, but surely sticking ectoplasm into a human being wasn't a good idea…? But then, he also supposed that he shouldn't question the wisdom of two seasoned ghost experts, either. Maybe Danny had some kind of reaction to the stuff, and the introduction of more of it worked like anti-venom or something. He didn't know, his strong point was technology, not medicine. Still….

Tucker looked up from his meal; if he wasn't going to eat, he may as well tune back in to the conversation.

"Look, Danny, all I'm saying is, if you're afraid, what better way than to face those fears?"

"I didn't say I was afraid! And you're crazy!" Tucker grinned at Danny's indignant expression. He and Sam were sitting across from Danny, and the blue-eyed teen was looking to Tucker like he was desperate for a way out of whatever Sam was suggesting. "Come on, Tuck, tell her she's crazy."

"I dunno Danny, Sam's got a point; facing your fears is better than running away from them forever." Tucker's grin never faded. He might not know what it was they were talking about, but it was worth it for the priceless, wide-eyed expression his friend was wearing. Sam, on the other hand, was looking to Tucker with approval and just a hint of victory on her lips.

"Thank you, Tucker. See Danny?" Danny looked wholly unconvinced, but before he could open his mouth to say otherwise, Sam had already continued. "So it's settled, then. Tomorrow, Tucker and I are coming over and we won't be leaving until we've conquered your fear together." The disbelief in Danny's eyes was quickly morphing into abject horror, and suddenly Tucker didn't feel like messing with his friend anymore. What was going on?

"Um, Sam?"

"Yeah, Tuck?"

"_How_ exactly are we gonna 'conquer' Danny's fear?" His stomach churned uneasily at the Cheshire-like glint in Sam's violet eyes. He really shouldn't have eaten the Mega Meaty sloppy joe today.

"Isn't it obvious?" At Tucker's dubious look, she continued, the innocent look on her face at odds with her words. "We're breaking and entering."


	3. Just Us

A/N: Long chapter, WoOt. Turns out I had more time than I thought this week, so I decided to crank out this baby instead of sleeping last night (not meant to be a pity party, I just meant that I was completely seized by inspiration and could not leave the computer until I had this done). So sorry if parts of this don't make too much sense, they made more sense last night. Anyhow, because I see quite a few story alerts and faves but have no idea how to reply to those, I'm just going to go ahead and say here: THANK YOU FOR ALL THE LOVE. You inspire me to keep writing, but really.

And sorry if I haven't replied to your review personally! I tend to lose track of those things.

Enjoy this huge, somewhat angsty update! :) ~IM

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><p><strong>Chapter Two:<strong> Just Us

After lunch, the rest of the school day was a bit of a blur; P.E. always went by pretty quickly, despite Danny's and Tucker's utter lack of athletic abilities, and History hadn't been much different.

Ms. Karam had simply reminded everyone that they would be having a guest speaker the next day before putting on a short documentary on the First Ghost War. Most of the class fell promptly asleep, but a few staunch students made it through the first forty-five minutes or so. Even Sam, who harbored—according to Danny and Tucker—an unnatural fascination with history, had trouble keeping her eyes open after that.

Everyone in the class knew all about ghosts and even more about the war; they had heard plenty from their parents and older siblings. It had lasted six years, and consisted of the biggest clash between humans and ghosts thus far. Some of them had even lost family in the conflict, but because it had ended when most of them were one or two years old, the freshman class of Casper High found it difficult to think of the war as anything other than another past event with dates and names to memorize.

The documentary ended with some talk of the good things that had come from the first paranormal war—new technology and a sense of preparedness, should there ever be a second—and Sam, Tucker, and Danny eagerly rushed back to Mr. Lancer and their homeroom.

Danny, for one, couldn't be happier that the day was finally done; it left him free to think about other things, like Sam, her crazy ideas, and how mad he was at Tucker—and himself—for not thinking before opening his big mouth.

Even as he waved goodbye to his friends and began the fifteen minute or so walk back to the giant, neon "FentonWorks" sign that signaled his home—his dad never was one for subtlety—he couldn't stop thinking about how impossibly _stupid_ he could be.

Yes, it did bother him that he was having weird, too-real dreams about his parents and that they had to go and fuel his paranoia by locking the basement door and watching him like a _hawk_ if he was ever within two feet of it_._ Did that mean he had to tell Sam that? No. Did he tell her that? Of_ course_ he did!

It wasn't hard; all he _had_ to do was tell Sam that he'd been having recurring nightmares and thus, trouble sleeping. DONE. Problem solved. But no, he'd needed _advice_ of all things.

Sure, all he'd asked her was how—hypothetically speaking, of course—she would confront her parents about keeping secrets from her, but that had led to Sam asking what secrets he meant which led to…you get the picture. Point was, now the girl was hell-bent on finding out just _what _his parents were hiding from him in order 'conquer his fears' while satisfying her own, morbid curiosity.

"_You could just say no, Danny._"Tucker had said. The bespectacled boy had admitted earlier that he hadn't really been paying attention—something which Danny was still a little peeved about—and offered to take his side should he decide to shoot down his girl-who-was-a-friend-but-not-my-girlfriend's schemes to break into his basement.

He shook his head at that thought. Sam was nothing short of unyielding, and if Danny said no she'd probably get herself into even bigger trouble without him. Plus, she'd been right when she said that the chance that there was something horrible residing in his parents' "secret lair" of sorts was just as great as the possibility that the elder Fentons just didn't want anyone going through their old stuff. After all, there were probably plenty of dangerous, old research projects that they had kept when they quit ghost hunting.

Danny stopped midstride, reminding himself to breathe before continuing forward.

All right, so if he wasn't going to stop her, might as well go over the plan she'd concocted so he could play his part. Phase one, as Sam had put it, started with Danny informing his parents and sister that his friends would be coming over tomorrow.

Simple enough.

Phase Two began once they were together; the three of them would break into the basement, eliminate the possibility of some dark, Fenton family secret, go back to his room after locking the door and reinitiating the security systems, and pretend like they had never left.

Again, easy.

Since Jazz typically stayed in her room when Sam and Tucker were over, and his parents were working up at the local research facility until six, no one would ever even know. So then why did it feel like this was going to end badly?

Danny groaned. Maybe it was because he could already sense that something would go wrong, like there being a second, silent alarm attached to the basement door that he wasn't aware of, but Danny couldn't help but feel like it had something to do with whatever they would find down there—no matter what Sam said to assure him otherwise.

Still, he couldn't exactly talk to his parents about it. They might ask him why he wanted to know, and—since Danny couldn't lie very well—he'd answer anything they asked, regardless of whether he was ready to or not. He didn't want to deal with something like that over a little misplaced paranoia, and he was pretty sure that there were some things about him that his parents were better off not knowing; like Dash's bullying or certain early morning incidents.

Speaking of which.

Danny brought his hand shakily to his chest, almost sighing when the warm flutter of a heartbeat greeted him. He'd been surreptitiously checking on and off throughout the day, but was no less relieved each time he felt the organ stubbornly proving his earlier thoughts wrong. Perhaps he was mistaken.

Still, even if he had only _imagined_ himself dead, that did not stop Danny from worrying how he would hide his slightly sickly appearance from his parents. At least, from his mom—she would be most likely to obsess over such a trivial thing, as she always had, and want to take blood samples or run tests specifically designed with his somewhat unique physiology in mind.

He grimaced at that thought; if Danny was right—and he had a feeling he was, despite any evidence to the contrary—his parents would not be particularly pleased with what they found….

Best not think about that just yet.

A sudden shudder wracked his thin frame, then, and he frowned slightly before checking the small, silvery device adorning his wrist for the first time that day. To the casual observer, it might seem as if he were only checking the time.

But the device was by no means a watch, and Danny cursed at what he saw in its cheery, LED lit screen before picking up the pace; breaking into a run once he saw his breath fog and condense in an eerie, bluish mist.

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><p>Fear can be a funny thing. People, as a general rule, tend to have many fears—some rational, some not—but all fears seem to have one, unified cause.<p>

Survival.

And perhaps it was this that had young Danny, hardly old enough to drive, let alone ponder his own mortality, quickly bounding through the front door of a large, imposing red building without any other thoughts on his parents or hiding himself until he looked a little less like death itself. Maybe it was this that also had him flicking on the Fenton family ghost shield without registering that his mother was in the kitchen, or that she would undoubtedly hear the low but loud hum that accompanied the glowing force field as it flickered into existence.

Or maybe, just maybe, it was the elation that fear and adrenaline and the thump, thump, thump of his racing heart were very _human_ traits that had him throwing caution to the wind.

"Danny!" His jumpsuit-wearing mother cried, immediately running to her son and throwing her arms about him in a sign of concern and relief that he appeared mostly unhurt. "Oh, sweetie, are you alright? You look like you've seen a ghost!"

Danny considered struggling, maybe pushing his mother away as most teenagers sought to do, but he couldn't bring himself to stop feeling the incredible warmth that radiated from his parent, nor the sweet scent that wafted from her reddish-brown hair. More proof that he was very much living, if only for the moment.

"Hah, you could say that. Jazz had a school council meeting, by the way. She says she's sorry but she might miss dinner." He managed, but between the little air he could take in thanks to his mother's tight hold and the strange morbidity his thoughts had taken, the light tone sounded a bit forced.

Maddie waved his statement off, as if well aware of her daughter's busy schedule and too concerned with her other child to think about it at the moment.

"How many were there this time?"

Danny thought a moment, seeming hesitant before glancing at the silvery device about his wrist again in order to study its no longer blinking screen. "Well…I _thought_ it was two. That's weird…." The portable ghost-tracker showed him and his mother as two little blue dots against a very plain, grid like layout that vaguely resembled the part of the street they lived on.

If there had been any ghosts in the area, he would see larger, red dots moving or staying still or whatever their ghostly counterparts were up to. He could've sworn he'd seen two massive ectoplasmic energies, practically on top of him, but now the screen seemed oddly if not eerily calm.

"I guess not." He finished lamely. "Sorry for the scare."

His mother broke her hold of him, putting him at arm's length so she could study his expression. "Honey, that's the third time a ghost has followed you this week. Now, I'm not one to question a ghost's motives—and your sensitivity to them has always made you a target of attacks—but Danny…this hasn't happened so often before, and frankly, I'm worried. You're lucky that you weren't late to school again because of…whatever this is."

He winced, remembering for a moment the Saturday detention slip sitting at the bottom of his backpack, which caused her to pause, her eyes calculating. "Is there something going on that I should know about? Ghosts feed off of negative emotions, sweetie; you really shouldn't bottle up whatever it is that's bothering you, _especially_ with your…condition. And are you taking your medica—?"

"No." Danny said, just a little too quickly before rapidly backpedaling. "I mean, yes, I have been taking my meds, and no there's nothing going on." At the entirely unconvinced look upon his mother's face, he sighed. "I promise, you don't have to worry, Mom. I'm sure that the Fenton Watch," he displayed the now obviously Fenton-issue piece of tech, "is just registering me or something again. I have an ecto-signature, too, remember?"

He bit his lip at that last statement, hoping that the slight quiver in his voice wasn't too noticeable. He wasn't quite lying, exactly; he really did have a faint but very real ecto-signature due to the massive—or, massive when compared to the norm—amounts of ectoplasm free-floating in his bloodstream; but he knew as well as she did that the device on his wrist had been calibrated with that in mind so that it _wouldn't_ register him as a threat.

So, unless Danny's faint ecto-signature had grown, whether due to an increased amount of ectoplasm or otherwise—and what that otherwise could be, he wasn't thinking about, not one bit—there was no way that he would show up as a red dot on the little screen. And certainly not as two.

If Maddie Fenton thought of this, she didn't let it show; instead, she nodded slowly, her eyes far off in some guilt-ridden thought—as they always seemed to be when the subject of Danny's inhuman qualities came up, he couldn't help but notice—and when she spoke again, her voice seemed much less frenzied, and much more accepting of some unknown circumstance.

"Right." She replied; her eyes a little tired when they focused back on Danny's too-pale face and the still dark bags beneath his blue eyes. "You do look a little sick, though, sweetie." She removed a glove to tentatively touch her hand to her son's cool forehead, almost as if afraid that he would flinch away—a thought that didn't escape him as he fought the urge to do just that.

"Mind checking your blood-ectoplasm content for me? Just so I know I don't have to worry about you." She smiled, and he tried to return a smile of his own.

His face contorted into a grimace instead.

"Please?" She pleaded, again, her violet eyes suddenly seeming fragile and desperate in some way that Danny wasn't too sure he wanted to know. All thoughts of refusal and worrying about what was hiding in his blood were chased away.

"Fine." He sighed, pulling his left arm up so that the Fenton Watch was well within his eyesight. The fingers of his right hand worked deftly, years of practice aiding him in toggling quickly through the settings on the contraption. In a matter of seconds, a small needle poked itself out from the side of the object, allowing him to prick one of his right fingers enough to draw blood for the device.

"Ouch. I'll never get used to that…." He murmured, and his mother gave him a sympathetic smile before turning back to watch the screen as it analyzed the sample it was given. Both of them waited anxiously, though for differing reasons, for the marvel of science to make a sound. The thing beeped in an ill-fitting note of triumph when the test was done.

"_Analysis complete. Records show a 1% drop in ectoplasmic levels since last documented observation. Data also conclusively indicates a 98% stability overall. Homeostasis, maintained."_

Danny and his mother exhaled slowly, letting out breaths they both hadn't realized that they'd been holding. Maddie looked to him with a small, much less frightened smile and the boy felt himself return a grin with much more vigor than before.

"I guess you're fine, then."

He laughed, feeling lighter than he had in what seemed like days. "Yeah." He breathed. "I guess I am." His mother smiled more warmly at his relieved tone, and he tilted his head a bit. "Hey, where's Dad?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "Oh, you know your father; can't live without his fudge. He went to the groceries a few minutes ago to get some more."

"Are you serious? Didn't we buy some, like, yesterday?"

They laughed at that, both picturing the large, orange jump-suited man running through grocery aisles and dodging other shoppers in his pursuit of happiness.

Neither noticed the wisp of bluish mist that escaped Danny in the breaths between his laughs, nor the nearly imperceptible shiver that ran down his spine.

* * *

><p>"You ready?" Her eyes bored into her friends' during the last few minutes of Ms. Karam's lecture. For Sam Manson, the school day couldn't have been longer, and now that there were hardly ten minutes separating she and her "grand plan," the girl was nearly breaching her usual apathy in the face of anticipation.<p>

Tucker gave a curt nod and a small smile, trying and failing to pay attention to whatever Ms. Karam was going on about—although that had more to do with the fact that Ms. Karam was "mighty fine, and totally digging the T-man" than her actual lesson—while Danny spared a glance to the clock hanging above the chalkboard that their instructor was using.

_Nine minutes and counting. _He mouthed, grinning at the excitement threatening to spill over from her eyes. The look on her face was a rare form of cheer that she only reserved for monster-movie nights or similar weekend activities with her friends. She almost never smiled during school hours.

But Sam had every reason to smile; not only was Danny looking much better than he was not twenty-four hours ago—something she had noted with satisfaction in the morning—but he also seemed to now fully support her plans to rid him of his fears; a fact that she wasn't about to complain over.

Seven minutes, fifty seconds.

She drummed her fingers lightly, occasionally sharing an anxious grin with her friends as the rest of the class's gaze seemed to gravitate towards the only point of interest in the room, just above their teacher's head.

Five more minutes.

"...The Guys in White had counted upon the Fentons to create some sort of "portal" into the ghosts' world, so that _we_ could take the fight to _them_. However, they never completed their pet project, due to familial troubles, and likely destroyed the machine to prevent ecto-exposure to children around Amity Park and the world…."

Sam and Tucker, along with the half of the class that had heard Ms. Karam, turned to glance at a suddenly tense, wide-eyed Danny.

"The fact that it was never completed, some speculate, is the main reason that the conflict between our worlds never escalated in full, and why Mayor Masters was able to negotiate peace with the more sentient ghosts; officially bringing an end to the First Ghost War. Any questions?"

There were two minutes left in class, though the classroom's attention had been drawn to something far more interesting than the clock or Ms. Karam; namely, three certain students, sitting in the middle of the classroom and the glares of their peers.

Sam scowled back at as many of her classmates as she could, silently demanding that they _leave Danny alone or else_, but the message didn't seem to sink in. Especially with Dash—his sneer was most prominent among the crowd.

"No?" Ms. Karam called again, sounding completely oblivious to her students' silent war and the fact that one of her own students was a Fenton and thus object of disdain. "Well, that's all I have for you then." She turned to face her class, and Sam noted with annoyance that immediately the entire room shifted back to looking to the front.

What _sheep_.

The bell chose that moment to ring, and Ms. Karam called over the rush and bustle of people packing their bags and sorting through their things that she was sorry that their guest speaker hadn't come today, and that they could look forward to the fact that he would definitely be coming on the following Monday. When she said to have a nice weekend, Sam scoffed.

"Come on, Danny. We have to get to Lancer, remember?" She whispered, helping him pack after noticing that a few too many eyes had fallen back to her friend, still numb with shock, for her liking. She knew the rumors that circulated, even if she pretended not to—for Danny and Tucker's sakes, she told herself—but sometimes it really pissedher off that people could be so immature.

"Yeah." Danny said, eyes still a little glazed from the strange surge of attention he'd received in class. It was as though, for one, striking moment, everyone who'd ever pretended that he didn't exist had actually seen him. Seen him, and _hated _him.

Sam helped her friend to her feet, but bristled when she heard the obviously loud-enough-for-everyone-to-hear snickers of the one jerk she'd been trying to avoid.

"Gosh, Fen-_turd_, as if you weren't already a _freak_. Now you're telling me that your parents up and quit just because their son was too _weird_?" None other than Dash Baxter punctuated this with a loud laugh and high fives with a few of his friends. He ran a hand through his ugly, bleach-blond hair before continuing.

"Man, it must suck, knowing that you're the reason that everyone hates your freaky, ghost-loving family. Heck, Valerie's mom might still be around if your parents weren't total _losers_." More laughter.

While Dash and his fellow jocks continued to joke around at Danny's expense, the poor boy merely sat, as if still trying to process the looks of absolute loathing—tinged with fear of the unknown, of the unusual—that he'd only seen in his nightmares. After a few attempts to get him on his way to the door, Sam gave an exasperated sigh at her friend's stupefied expression and, upon sharing a hard look with Tucker, turned to the one boy that she could honestly say she hated.

"Leave him alone." She said firmly, eyes defiant and full of the air of rebellion that she always seemed to carry with her. A hint of fear crossed Dash's face, his eyes looking more than a little at a loss over fact that someone had stood up to him, but he snorted and played it off readily.

"Oh man, Fentonio, can't believe you're letting your _girlfriend _fight for you now. Lucky for you, I don't hit girls." He paused, still smirking, but looking in Sam's now furious eyes as he addressed the boy standing dejectedly behind her. "What's next, your mom? Or…how about your hottie of a sister?" A couple of whistles and whoops followed that, and Danny seemed to snap to life. With a determined step forward, he pushed Sam back, opening his mouth to give the bigger, stronger boy a piece of his mind.

"Hey, you don't have any right to—"

The words were smacked away from his lips by a solid punch to the jaw.

The effects were immediate; Danny went down, lip split and bleeding, and the jocks—Dash included—took off towards Lancer's room, still whooping like monkeys, before they could be linked to the scene of the crime. Concern etched its way on both of his friends' faces as Danny rose shakily back to his feet, grasping Sam and Tucker's extended arms when he threatened to topple over.

"Are you okay, man?" Tucker asked, and for once all Danny did was nod, a sort of resigned expression on his face. Sam's heart clenched at the thought that getting teased and then punched for trying to defend himself and his loved ones was something he or anyone was used to.

"That jerk." Sam said, voice shaking as she fought back angry tears. "Don't worry Danny, we're gonna tell Mr. Lancer and the principal and they'll—"

"Sam, drop it." Danny sighed, and she couldn't deny the silent plea in his tired eyes. "Let's just get to homeroom, okay? We're already a few minutes late, and I don't need another detention…."

The three of them walked together to Mr. Lancer's room, then, their plans for the weekend forgotten in the face of more pressing matters for the moment.

* * *

><p>"Ouch, Danny, what happened?"<p>

The redheaded girl took in the dried blood on her brother's chin, as well as the prominent bruise forming on his jaw. If she didn't know any better, she'd say her little brother had been knocked some time into next week.

He gave her a sheepish grin, replying easily and with a few notes of practiced humor in his voice. "It's not as bad as it looks really, and I was just being stupid. I totally walked right into a door, just as some guy was opening it." His grin widened, careful not to aggravate the wound on his lip. "Just my luck, huh?"

Jazz Fenton rolled her eyes. Her brother could be so absent-minded and clumsy sometimes; it was a miracle that he'd made it to fourteen. "Well, be careful next time, okay Danny? I don't want Mom and Dad to think you're being beaten up at school or something."

Perhaps it was the irony of the situation, or the disapproving way that his friends were looking at him, but Danny laughed at that—a good, honest laugh that brought a smile to his sister's face.

"I'm glad that you're feeling better today, little brother. I worry about you when you're as out of it as you were." She tousled his hair, sharing a small smile of understanding with Sam and Tucker behind him. "You know I love you, right? And that you can tell me anything? Studies show that teens at your stage of development sometimes need to be reminded that there are people who are still willing to care and to listen, and I just want to make sure that you know that I am, no matter what."

Danny frowned at the psychobabble as he attempted to pat his dark locks back in place before addressing his sister. "Yeah, yeah, yeah, but leave my hair out of it, okay?" At her amused smile, his grin found its way back onto his face. "And…thanks. For, you know, forging Mom's signature on my detention slip. I don't think she would've let Sam and Tucker come over otherwise."

Jazz winked. "No problem, Danny, but you owe me big time, got it?"

"Got it." He sighed, and she laughed before waving goodbye to him and his friends. She had yet another meeting to attend, and they were off to FentonWorks, to do who-knows-what in the hours they would be alone.

Sam turned to Danny, face more serious than it had been less than half an hour ago. "You think that 'ghost portal' that Ms. Karam was talking about could have anything to do with…well, you?"

Danny shook his head. "I honestly don't know. Maybe that's what my parents are hiding down there, but maybe not. Supposedly it was destroyed, right?"

Tucker frowned. "I dunno man, you said your parents didn't mention it to you or Jazz, right? So why would they bother keeping something like that a secret if it was destroyed?" His frown deepened. "And how is that publicly accessible information, anyway?"

Danny looked between his two best friends, wondering what they had gotten themselves into. "Only one way to find out, I guess." He said, looking up as they came to stop in front of the familiar, but somehow new rust-red building that he called home.

"You ready?" Sam repeated, mouth pressed to a thin line.

"Ready as I'll ever be."


	4. What Waits Below

A/N: Hey guys! Sorry this took so long, 3 year hiatus due to life and stuff lol. Anyway, here's long-awaited chapter three, with chapter four coming out next week! (Hopefully, but knowing me that will be 2018 lol)

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Three:<strong> What Waits Below

* * *

><p>Tucker Foley gave a small cheer when the final lock on the door before him undid itself. "And you guys said PDA's were useless." He said, a triumphant grin stretching his features. His two best friends rolled their eyes at that, but he pretended not to notice. <em>Haters gonna hate.<em>

It had been surprisingly easy, breaking into the Fentons' basement; Danny had snagged the key to the physical lock—the one his mother kept on her person along with those of the Fenton Ghost Assault Vehicle—at breakfast, and the electronic locks didn't really put up much of a fight. Then again, the dark-skinned boy mused smugly, it would have been impossible for anyone less than tech savvy; and Tucker was, by all means, a more than necessarily experienced hacker.

In any case, the ease of the feat had still surprised him—and from the glances exchanged among his fellows, Tucker knew he wasn't the only one.

"You know," Sam began, "for a super top-secret whatever, you'd think there'd be more than two layers of security."

Danny shrugged, looking for the most part unsurprised. "Well, these are my parents we're talking about, here. My mom might be so-thorough-it's-scary, but my dad…." He trailed off. Tucker didn't need to see the exasperated smile that followed to know what his friend was talking about.

It was no secret that Maddie Fenton was the more competent of the famous Fenton ghost-hunting duo; and, as far as Tucker was concerned, he was content to believe that the woman's own self-confidence kept them from installing any further barriers to their basement door. Judging from the narrowed glance Sam was giving said entrance, however, he and Danny might be the only ones.

"Well, what're we waiting for?" Tucker cried dramatically, humor coloring his tone. "Let's just go, already." From the corner of his eye, he noticed Sam's slow, determined nod, and Danny's uneasy gulp.

"Right." Sam said. "Danny? You wanna lead the way?"

Tucker watched Danny's eyes grow a little too wide, and gave his friend an encouraging smile. _Come on, man. Just a minute ago you were all smiles. It can't really be _that_ bad, can it? _He blinked, Danny's grim expression seeming to answer his unspoken thoughts.

_Yes. Yes it can._

Danny stepped forward, mouth still set resolutely, and Tucker found himself uneasy for the first time since they'd concocted the whole scheme. What did Danny know that he wasn't telling them? Normally Tucker didn't pick up on these kinds of things, but his friend was just _radiating_ discomfort; something was wrong, and he knew it, now. But it was too late to take it back, too late to regret their decision as they plunged, down into the cold, unforgiving darkness, a silent alarm signaling their intrusion behind them as soon as they had opened the door.

* * *

><p>It was pitch black when they reached the bottom of the stairs. Not that Sam minded the darkness; she always did say she was a creature of the night.<p>

No, the dark she was fine with; it was the cold that she couldn't stand. It reminded her of things that she really didn't want to think about—like a winter frost killing her garden or the chills up and down one's spine when a ghost was near.

She shivered.

And the _smell_. It hit them all in a wave of gross, stagnant, stale air that hadn't moved in decades, causing all three of them to gasp and cover their noses. It reminded her of the time her grandfather had been ill and dying, lying in the same bed and room for weeks before the end; the smell hadn't been as strong as this, but there was no mistaking the scent of death. _Maybe this wasn't such a great idea,_ she thought, briefly, before shaking her head. _I can't see a damn thing._

She told herself that this was why she, Tucker, and Danny were fumbling, groping about in the shadows for a light switch; she comforted herself with thoughts of irrational fears of ghosts-that-weren't-there due to her upbringing in Amity Park. Even as she breathed a sigh of relief upon feeling the firm reassurance of a switch beneath her chilled fingers, she told herself that nothing was hiding in the darkness.

"Guys, it's here, I found it."

She wanted to flick on the light because it was dark, she chided herself, and she needed to see; not because she could smell, feel, _taste_ the presence of somethingburning and acrid that inspired nausea and just a hint of bone-chilling fear to curl in her stomach. No, none of that existed, it was just dark, and they needed light—her mind was playing tricks on her.

She would never admit to the feeling, deep in her gut, that there was something horribly, sickeningly _off_ about the place they had entered.

"God, what is that smell?" She heard herself joke aloud.

"E-ectoplasm." Came a strangled whisper.

When her eyes finally adjusted to the flickering fluorescent lights, she looked around and froze, afraid for a moment before relaxing. _Oh_, she thought, mouth suddenly dry, _that explains the stink._

The basement was obviously meant to be a lab of some sort; its floor, ceiling, and walls all seemed to be comprised of the same, harshly gleaming metal—probably ghost-proof, she thought—and the tables lining the walls all seemed to contain various tools. Sam could see all manner of weapons, dissection apparatuses, and vials upon vials filled with glowing, green fluid—all the remnants of what was supposed to be a long-forgotten trade of the Fenton family.

The ominously fresh stain on the examination table in the center of the room begged to differ.

Sam wrinkled her nose at the sight, disgust accompanied by the feeling of momentary relief in seeing that there were no live ghosts to deal with. "I thought your parents gave up ghost hunting?" When no one replied, Sam looked away to glance to her right, where she had last heard her friend's voice.

"Danny?" The boy looked, if possible, paler than usual. "What's wrong?" Luckily, her voice seemed to snap him out of whatever dark thoughts had arisen in his mind, and Danny blinked a few times before his color returned.

"Nothing." He murmured, shaking his head a little. "I just…thought I sensed a ghost." Sam raised a skeptical brow, but accepted the answer nonetheless. "And…I dunno, I guess they're still hunting, just outside of the GiW's influences…?"

Though his expression remained neutral, and purposefully so, Sam thought she saw a flicker of fear in his eyes at his next words. "I _thought _that they'd gotten past all that, and were only interested in ghosts for research now…."

She saw Tucker shift awkwardly out of the corner of her eye. "Your parents used to hate ghosts more than anyone, man. I mean, they used to rip them apart for the government, right? That kind of habit dies hard." This seemed to be the wrong thing to say, as something in Danny's face twisted, and both Sam and Tucker were left feeling lost.

"Danny?" She called softly, edging towards him. She placed a cautious hand on his shoulder, wanting nothing more than to bring him into a hug. "You okay?" He nodded, neutral expression back in place. She frowned. "I wouldn't worry too much, Danny. They're just ghosts; it's not like they can feel pain anyway." Her expression hardened. "All they know how to do is fight and destroy."

She didn't feel the way he tensed under her, didn't register the hurried way he shrugged her hand away. "Y-yeah." He said, laughing a little nervously. "You're right, Sam, I wasn't thinking."

She smiled, although she couldn't help the worry that rose up in her chest. She knew that Danny had always been somewhat more sympathetic to ghosts—and who wouldn't be, with a condition like his—but she didn't think the sight of something like this would disturb him so much. She worried that something else was going on, something just beneath the surface of that placid expression, and she couldn't quite put her finger on it.

Tucker, on the other hand, seemed less concerned with Danny's reaction. He was too preoccupied with studying their surroundings to notice anything odd.

"Woah, dude! Look at those things! What do you think they do?" He exclaimed, gesturing at the table furthest from the door. A few dozen devices littered the table, an organized chaos of flashing lights and digital output. Most of the machines were crusted with the same goo filling the vials on the table closest to the door, but one device in particular—the smallest of the pile—stood out as almost completely covered in glistening green.

Sam sighed; of course Tuck would only be interested in the tech. Her eyes never left Danny, though, who had started to wander about the lab. She silently hoped that whatever he found would ease his mind.

Danny was studying the walls of the place, marveling at how clean they were compared to the tools and tables lining them. So many gadgets, most he could only guess at the purpose of. His eyes followed the seam in the middle of the wall, resting briefly on Tucker—who was busily examining the slimy machinery, fingers deterred only by the fresh ectoplasm coating it—and Sam, and finally coming to what appeared to be a sealed door on the far side of the room. His throat felt dry again, like it had when he'd smelled the ectoplasm in the room.

"I wonder what this button does?" Tucker exclaimed, reaching for the small, red button adorning an otherwise innocuous device.

Danny's ripped his widening gaze from the shining metal door. "Tuck, don't—"

Before either Danny or Sam could react, the sealed door began to open, harshly whining against its rusted metal, and swirling green mist filled the room. Danny gasped for breath; the mist pulled heavily on his chest, and he fell to his knees. He vaguely registered Sam calling his name.

"Danny!" She called, but before she could rush to his side, a deafening roar tore her eyes away from him. She and Tuck turned, as if in slow motion, to see a frightening beast clawing its way between the half-opened doors. Its eyes glowed green, and its ears pulled back aggressively. The beast snarled, revealing sharp canines within its black, grisly maw. "Tucker, let's—"

Danny watched in horror as the beast pushed its way through, knocking Sam and Tucker both to the ground. It roared again, brandishing its long claws and threatening to rip his friends to shreds. Sam and Tucker lay prone, knocked out from the fall. Danny tried to scream, yell, anything to distract the monster, but all that could escape his tightened throat was a cool blue mist.

Suddenly, the beast stopped, sniffing the air. Danny's heart leapt as it leveled its steely gaze on him. He still couldn't move, and he could feel himself start to shake as it approached. He gripped his chest _Not now_. He thought furiously. _God, please, not now._ He fell to the ground, facing the swirling green portal and the wolf-like creature.

As it drew closer, Danny could see that its black fur glowed green, and that its front paws were metal prosthetics. He shook more violently, able only to watch the beast watch him.

It touched him, surprisingly gentle, and spoke. "Kvietigxu, reĝido. Mi prizorgos ĉi kaj eliru el ĉi tie."

Danny's eyes widened; he could feel the pressure on his chest receding. "Don't." He managed to croak. He could hear the front door slam, coupled with yelling from upstairs.

The beast furrowed its brow, glancing from the entrance of the lab to Danny before sighing. "Mi reestos."

"Okay." Danny replied, watching as the creature leapt through the roof without damaging it. His eyes fell to the portal, musing at how well he understood the ghost just as his parents came rushing through the lab door. He felt like he was in his dream again.

His eyes slipped closed as his father brought a glowing needle to his chest.


	5. What Lies Within

A/N: Woo, update! Sorry this chapter took so long, I had a bad case of writer's block on one of these scenes (can you tell which? lol) but I FINALLY finished it after a few weekends. Thank you all for the lovely reviews and I did purposely leave the Esperanto untranslated last chapter for some suspense (sorry). It is translated in this chapter, though!

**Anyway, at the request of reviewers, a quick recap:** In this universe, Danny never had the portal accident, but he does have ectoplasm in his blood and he suffers from seizures when exposed to foreign ectoplasmic matter; this has been true for as long as he can remember. His parents haven't told him why this happens or what is wrong with him, but they occasionally "treat" him for his condition by injecting ectoplasm into him, etc. He's always had nightmares about being chased by something, but only recently starting seeing his parents in these nightmares; Sam hoped that any anxiety he has around his parents could be resolved by exploring their lab and finding nothing of note down there. It goes wrong, and Wulf springs from the portal none of them knew existed. Wulf recognized Danny, and at Danny's request left before his parents could see him. Now Danny wonders what his parents might be hiding from him...

Thanks again for reading and enjoy!

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter Four:<strong> What Lies Within

* * *

><p>Wulf grinned, his glinting canines standing out against the swirling green of the ghostly realm. He'd finally found them, the hunters who took his claws all those years ago. He could not see them, but a sniff of the air told him they had been in this area not too long ago.<p>

He'd been tracking them through the ghost zone for over a decade, now. Though, for a ghost, he supposed, it was the equivalent of a few days; time passed so slowly in this realm. Still, perhaps if he waited only a few days, years more, they might return to this place; their scent was strongest here. He figured this was where the humans had built their portal, if the rumors were to be believed.

He sighed—what he wouldn't give to be able to claw through dimensions again. Narrowed green eyes glanced towards his wrists, where harsh, gleaming metal met dark, unruly fur.

It had taken some convincing, but by bribing the self-proclaimed greatest hunter in the ghost zone he'd managed to get these functional, if gaudy, replacements for his paws. Skulker did like his trophies, and Wulf had the unique and handy ability of being able to scent out anything with an ecto-signature; a few pelts for the ghost, and he had claws again. That same skill led him straight here—where the acrid scent of ecto-weapons was hanging in the air.

He wondered vaguely if the humans still had the little phantom, or if they had butchered the cub like so many of Wulf's comrades and enemies alike. The thought made a growl rise in his throat. At the very least, he might be able to take vengeance for himself and the cub—perhaps for all ghosts.

A portal manifested, just feet from him. It swirled lazily into existence, drawing another toothy grin from Wulf. After all these years, he would have his revenge.

He took his first step through the mist, and immediately the smell of death hit him. His eyes burned with rage as he roared.

He rushed forwards, swiping at the tiny humans, not noticing and not caring if they were the ones he'd searched for. Surely if they were in this horrible place, they'd had some part in it. They screamed as he approached, and he wanted to laugh at their terror. He would kill them, just as they'd killed—

But as he took another whiff of the tainted air, something else caught his attention. Something impossible.

* * *

><p><em>Be still, prince,<em> the creature said, _I will take care of this, and get us out of here._ Danny's vision was hazy, he felt feverish again. He wanted to ask where the wolf wanted to take him, wanted to ask why it called him prince when he was pretty sure his parents weren't royalty, wanted to tell it not to hurt his friends and family. All he could manage was a single, croaked command.

_Don't._

The wolf seemed paralyzed by his response, and Danny could see that behind those fierce, glowing green eyes it was concerned for him. It gazed from him to the door, unsure. They could both hear his parents rushing for the stairs. With a sigh, it told him it would return.

The teen had a strange feeling it had said that before.

Danny awoke, eyes searching the darkened room for green eyes and dark fur. Posters of space and rows of model rockets stared back at him. He was in his room, but when did he get here? Just moments ago, he was speaking to the wolf-ghost and then his parents—

_ Crap, my parents._ He groaned. He remembered now, his parents must have moved him to his room after seeing the state he, Sam, and Tucker were in. His eyes widened.

_ Sam! And Tucker!_ He leapt out of bed, immediately regretting the motion as his sides protested. Freezing at a sudden thought, he placed a hand to his chest. His furiously beating heart greeted him. _For now_, he thought drily. Still, it was good to know before talking to his parents. He shuddered at the thought of dissections and ectoplasmic remains.

He made his way over to the stairs, wincing at the ache in his joints. He felt like he'd been in bed for days, but a quick glance at the clock revealed it'd only been an hour or so since he and his friends had ventured into the basement. _Jazz'll be home soon,_ he mused. As he reached the rail, he could hear hushed, urgent whispers. He wondered what his parents didn't want him to hear. He slowly placed each foot on the first step, straining his ears to catch snippets of conversation.

"…we _have _to tell him, now, Mads…."

"…Jack, you know why we _can't_, he'd…."

"…Wait, listen, what was that?"

Danny cursed as the next step creaked beneath his weight. He wanted so badly to know just what his parents were so worried about telling him. Was it the fact that they had a working ghost portal and hadn't told anyone? Something about the strange wolf-ghost, maybe? He couldn't just dismiss his dreams as figments of his imagination, now, could he?

"…Danny? Is that you, sweetheart?"

His thoughts cut short. He realized quickly that if he didn't say anything, his parents would just come upstairs anyway; there was no way he'd hear the rest of their conversation. He took a steadying breath.

"Yeah, mom, it's me." He walked quickly towards the kitchen, where he found his parents huddled around the small, round dining table. Their shoulders were tense, their creased brows silently asking what he'd heard. _Not nearly enough, _he thought with a frown. His mother was the first to get up from the table.

"Oh, honey, are you feeling alright? You're so pale." She raised a hand to his forehead, and it took all of his willpower not to flinch away. Her frown deepened. "What's wrong, sweetie?"

"I'm fine, mom, really." He sighed, brushing her hand away from his face. "Are Sam and Tucker okay?"

His mother nodded, looking more like she was eyeing a cobra about to strike than her only son. "We sent them home after we took care of you. They're fine, but they couldn't remember much of what happened in the lab. We were hoping you could tell us—"

He raised both hands. "Hold on, first, are you guys gonna tell me what's going on with that lab down there? I thought you didn't hunt ghosts anymore? And what's with that… that portal?"

His parents exchanged uneasy glances. He could sense that something silent passed between them. Danny shivered, crossing his arms over his chest. His heart gave a little flutter. Had it always been so cold in here?

"Well…." His mother paused. "To be honest, we've been hunting in secret for a few years now…." She pursed her lips. "I'm sorry we didn't tell you sooner, sweetie."

"Why?" Danny asked slowly. Although he felt he could hazard a guess; all that ectoplasm they used in his meds had to come from somewhere he supposed—he just always thought they'd only hunted the _bad_ ghosts, the ones that didn't honor the treaty. Or synthesized it. His father silently studied the back of his gloved hands, feigning disinterest.

"We've been…well, you see, we needed…." His mother trailed off. The word 'ectoplasm' hung, unsaid, in the air—weighing down each of them in different ways.

"So...you've just been taking ghosts from their homes and killing them? Even after the war ended?" Danny clutched at his chest. He remembered their twisted faces in his dream, the wet sound of damaged flesh. The terror he felt as he thought he was next.

His mother frowned. "No, Danny, sweetheart you don't understand—"

"Don't understand what? I thought you said that not all ghosts were bad and—"

"Danny," His father stood, gesturing towards him, "Everything we've ever done has been to help you—"

"By killing and dissecting ghosts?" _But what if I'm more ghost than human?_ Danny felt his blood run cold; his fingers felt like ice. He backed away from his mom, trying not to register the hurt in her eyes. She looked nothing like the fiery warrior from his nightmares. "There was a wolf-ghost that came through the portal, it _knew _me, and it called me prince—"

His parents flinched. His mother's eyes shone in the fluorescent lighting. "Danny, I…we…. Please." She stretched a hand towards him, begging him to calm down, to listen. He shivered again—it was freezing in the small kitchen. How were they not cold?

His father heaved a deep sigh, casting a forlorn glance towards Danny's mother. "Mads, we have to tell him." Jack's eyes met Danny's. "We owe him that much."

Danny creased his brows, his grip on his shirt loosening. "Tell me what?"

Maddie froze. She faltered, outstretched hand falling. "Danny…honey…." Her eyes welled with tears. "I'm so sorry."

Jack moved to take Maddie into his arms, pulling her softly against his chest. "Danny, the truth is…we needed to hunt ghosts…." His father gulped. "To keep you safe. There are a lot of ghosts who would kill to find you."

Danny felt his heart stop. "Wh…what do you mean?"

"Y-you're being hunted by ghosts," Maddie sobbed, eyes red and puffy, "and it's all our fault. If only we hadn't—" She buried her face in her hands.

"Hadn't what?" Danny whispered. He was feeling more confused by the second, watching his parents fall apart before him.

"Danny, we…that is, your mother and I…we opened the portal so that we could save you. You need periodic ectoplasmic injections to balance your unique chemistry, to stay alive, I'm sure you know." At the look on Danny's face, Jack clarified. "All of the stuff we use for you is synthetic, of course, but we needed to collect samples from the ghost zone to perfect our formula."

"And when we opened the portal…." Maddie sniffled. "Ghosts started coming through, started hunting you. Somehow, despite our best efforts, they knew you were…." She trailed off. "Well, different. And without the portal, we can't hope to cure you…. We had to capture them, interrogate them down in the basement...but we still don't know who's behind all of it after all these years..."

Memories came rushing back to him. It all started to make sense, how ghosts would suddenly appear wherever he was; birthday parties, school outings…kids started calling him a freak because of it, saying his "weirdo parents" must have been behind it somehow. They weren't exactly wrong.

"But why me?" He shivered again; it was so cold his breath was fogging in the air. His parents still didn't seem to notice the chill in the air.

"Because you're—"

"A ghost, dear boy." A voice, smooth and arrogant, filled the room. A dark-haired figure materialized into the room, floating effortlessly just inches from the ceiling. It exposed sharp fangs in a smirk. "Well, half a ghost, if you want to be precise. And it's all thanks to these poor fools." Blood red eyes drifted towards Danny's parents. They quickly drew their weapons, each ecto-pistol whining as it was charged.

"Who are you?" Maddie demanded, throwing herself between Danny and the malevolent being. She looked more like the huntress Danny saw in his dreams, now—eyes ablaze with fiery resolve. "Are you the one who's after our boy?"

Danny hardly had time to grasp what the ghost was saying before the specter fired red ectoplasmic beams towards both of his parents, knocking them out cold with the blast. "No!" Danny yelled, finding his voice.

"Hush now, child." The blue-skinned ghost sneered. "Do you wish to alert the whole of the two zones? There's a reason your parents kept all of this a secret; you'd be torn apart, dissected bit by bit in any world." Red eyes again drifted towards his parents. "Even they considered you an experiment."

"You're lying," Danny glared; ice filling his veins once more. "Even if you're telling the truth about the ghost thing, my parents would never—"

"No?" The ghost laughed—it was a poisonous, harsh sound. "They're the ones who made you what you are. It's their fault you can't even face another ghost without losing control of your body, as you are now."

Danny was starting to shake. He could feel an episode coming on, and he feared that was what the ghost wanted. It had been stalling for time. The ghost smirked mockingly as if reading his thoughts.

"Who are you? What do you want with me?" Danny asked, defiant tone belying the fear in his eyes. The ghost's smirk only grew.

"You may call me Vlad Plasmius. And it's not about what I want." He scoffed. "But what you want." The ghost gestured towards him. "You see—I know why your body reacts the way it does, and I plan to…accelerate things." The ghost charged a red ectoplasmic ball in its palm, aiming for Danny's chest. "Let's see if you have what it takes, shall we?"

Danny's eyes widened as he watched the ghost fling the ball of ectoplasmic energy towards him. He wanted to move, to do _something_ but he felt frozen on the spot. Like he had when the wolf-ghost had barreled past his friends and towards him.

Said wolf-ghost came crashing through house, tearing Danny away from his spot in the kitchen just in time to avoid the blast. It gently draped him over its shoulder, before turning to snarl at Plasmius.

"Wulf!" Plasmius cursed, quickly firing off a second and third blast at the creature. "How many times must I have you killed, beast?"

"I thought I told you not to come get me." Danny muttered sluggishly, fighting to stay alert despite the dull ache behind his eyes.

"You told me not to fight the humans." The ghost called Wulf murmured gruffly between dodges. Danny wasn't surprised he understood it—him?—this time. "I am saving you from the ghost Plasmius." He finished matter-of-factly.

"Oh." Danny said lamely, head lolling against Wulf's shoulder blade. Wulf nodded, swiftly darting around the corner and out the front door, passing intangibly through a frightened Jazz on the way out. "Wait, wha bout Jazz. Gotta go back." Danny slurred at Wulf.

"No time, and she'll be fine." Wulf growled. "It's you he wants." He sprinted into the night, turning invisible just as Plasmius burst through the ceiling of the house in pursuit.

"Where are you?" The red-eyed ghost screamed, all traces of his cold, calculating demeanor gone. He fired an ectoplasmic beam at the pavement below, feet from the tip of Wulf's tail. "WULF!"

Danny felt himself slipping; he channeled his frustration into fighting against his feeble condition. "Where we goin'?"

"Somewhere safe." Wulf answered softly. "Just have to throw him off scent."

Danny scoffed. "Safe from crazy eyes? Where's tha…?"

Wulf turned to look behind them. Plasmius was flying off in another direction. They were safe for now. He skidded to a halt, turning to his now unconscious companion. Despite the fact that the boy could not hear him, Wulf whispered a response.

"The Ghost Zone."


End file.
